A Spoonful of Bad Health? UCSF Researchers Slam Sugar

By Katherine Hobson

Tobacco, alcohol … and sugar?

A new commentary published in Nature argues that just as the first two substances are regulated in various ways by government authorities, so should be sugar. While acknowledging that food, unlike alcohol and tobacco, is required for survival, the authors say taxes, zoning ordinances and even age limits for purchasing certain sugar-laden products are all appropriate remedies for what they see as a not-so-sweet problem.

The authors of the piece, Robert Lustig, Laura Schmidt and Claire Brindis, are all from the University of California, San Francisco. Lustig has been a particularly harsh (and longtime) critic of the impact of added sugars on health — here’s his widely viewed 2009 lecture on that topic. (Lustig was also a central character in a New York Times magazine piece on this subject last year.)

Note that they are talking about sugar added to foods. No one is arguing that we should spurn fruit, for example, because of the naturally occurring fructose.

“We believe attention should be turned to ‘added sugar,’ defined as any sweetener containing the molecule fructose that is added to food in processing,” the authors write. (And they argue the current dietary “bogeymen” — saturated fat and salt — deserve less scrutiny than the sweet white stuff.)

They’re talking about foods sweetened with sucrose — about half fructose and half glucose — and high-fructose corn syrup, which despite its name is mostly used in formulations that are 55% and 42% fructose.

The authors write that sugar is more than just empty calories — that growing evidence links fructose overconsumption with health problems including hypertension and diabetes. “Early studies” link it to cancer and cognitive decline, they write. They also argue that like tobacco and alcohol, “it acts on the brain to encourage subsequent intake.”

So, what’s a country to do? The authors propose taxing processed foods containing any kind of added sugars, including drinks and cereal. In addition, they suggest tightening licensing requirements on vending machines and snack bars selling sugary drinks in schools and at work, instituting zoning ordinances to restrict the number of fast-food restaurants and convenience stores in low-income neighborhoods and near schools, and even instituting an age limit for purchasing sugary drinks such as soda.

And they want the FDA to consider removing fructose from the list of ingredients deemed Generally Recognized as Safe. (Douglas Karas, an FDA spokesman, says that step is not currently being considered.)

The Sugar Association, not surprisingly, found a lot to dislike in the commentary. In a response published on its website, the industry group says that USDA stats show people are consuming about 425 more calories per day now than 40 years ago, with caloric sweeteners accounting for about 38 of those calories. Meantime, the group contends that consumption of cane and beet sugar has been falling even as obesity rates have been rising.

“We consider it irresponsible when health professionals use their platforms to instill fear by using words like ‘diabetes,’ ‘cancer,’ and even ‘death,’ without so much as one disclaimer about the fact that the incomplete science being referenced is inconclusive at best,” the association says.

The obesity problem “originates from the combination of overconsumption of all foods and lack of exercise. To label a single food as the one and only problem misinforms, misleads and confuses consumers, and simply adds to the problem,” the association says.

The National Confectioners Association, meantime, said that the group “supports realistic advice to Americans that accommodate all foods including occasional treats in moderation. There is a place for little pleasures, such as candy, in an overall lifestyle that supports health, wellness and happiness. In fact, helping the public understand how to incorporate little pleasures in their diet may well play the most important role in achieving and sustaining recommended dietary behaviors.”

If you do want to keep an eye on your sugar intake, the nutrition facts panel that appears on food packages now does not break out added and naturally-occurring sugars. But you can certainly see how many total grams of sugar you’re consuming.

Comments (5 of 37)

If they do regulate sugar it will be good for me because sugar upsets my stomach and I have to avoid it. I also have other food allergies, so I always read labels. Food processors do add sugar to almost everything such as frozen french fries, pasta sauce, tortillas, and dairy-free pizza, to name a few. It's very hard to avoid. They deliberately try to hide it by calling it names like "sucrose", "cane juice", "dextrose" (the sugar from corn), "apple juice concentrate" and whatever other names they can think of. If they do regulate sugar and manufacturers stop adding it to everything, there will be many more foods I can eat! Oh boy, that will be wonderful!
BTW, you don't have to drink soda or fruit-flavored drinks. I've been getting along for years on water, unsweetened tea, and the very occasional diet coke. You should be able to get water or hot tea at most places...

4:36 pm February 7, 2012

Todd McKay wrote :

This is Orwellian because the truth is that sugar is probably the safest food possible. For a scientist to call it toxic is ridiculous. You could not OD on sugar. It is possible to OD even on water (due to electrolyte imbalance) but you could not OD on sugar so how could it be toxic?

Oh these are not real scientist they are Californians liberal scientist. The same folks that ensure that a bag of play sand purchased at the local Ace Hardware is labeled as a carcinogen. Thank you for keeping me safe and good luck banning sugar.

6:27 am February 7, 2012

guest wrote :

@ James--HFCS is being forced upon us....we do NOT have a choice! About the only things you could buy from a grocery store without HFCS would be from the fresh produce aisle and the fresh meat aisle. Just about everything else contains HFCS including bread and dairy products. Someone does not want the public to become educated about HFCS. There was a very revealing study published by a top Ivy League University, Princeton, about how HFCS is turned into fat immediately in the metabolic process and is not burned as energy, unlike natural sugar. That study was almost two years ago and no one in the media has reported anything about Princeton's discovery. I have personally written to many people in positions of power who could do something about this, but no one has responded to my letters nor done anything about this. Why is no one talking about this? Instead, the media is reporting on this Lustig character who is barking up the wrong tree. It is HFCS that is poisoning us and causing the epidemic of diabetes which has now begun to affect children! How many children will have to lose their lives as young adults due to the complications of diabetes before someone who can do something about this will?

9:11 pm February 6, 2012

Tom wrote :

We should also regulate fruits - because if you only eat fruits your entire life, you will die from no protien.
And we should regulate chicken - because if you only eat chicken your whole life you will die from a lack of certain vitamins, and nutrients such as calcium.
And we should regulate the consumption of water, because if you drink too much you could die from that too.
Man. It should all just be REGULATED. REGULATIONS are good. Look at California. They are the most successful state, and have no financial problems at all.

1:26 pm February 6, 2012

James wrote :

Educate people about HFCS and let the consumer make the decision. If we've learned nothing else, we have learned that foods that the "experts" consider poison are soon found to be not harmful at all. Saccharin got a bad rap in the sixties and it turned out to that the results could not be replicated in humans...rats were given the equivalent of a person eating several pounds per day.
Anything, when taken in enough quantity, can be harmful.
Consumers are smart enough to make decisions on their own.